


Hindrance

by thisbloodycat



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Cursed Child - Thorne & Rowling
Genre: Angst, Betrayal, Bonding, Department of Mysteries, Drama, Frustration, Infidelity, Jealous Scorpius, M/M, Minister for Magic Draco Malfoy, Mors principium est, Mutual Pining, Not Canon Compliant, Pining, Ravenclaw Scorpius Malfoy, Romance, Science Fiction Meets Magic, Slow Burn, Slytherin Albus Severus Potter, This Is Not Going To Go The Way You Think, Time Travel, Time Turner (Harry Potter), Traitors Traitors Everywhere, Trust Issues, Violence, but go ahead, but what is canon anyway, don't trust me, i think the ending is happy, of unending loops
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-11-20
Updated: 2019-11-28
Packaged: 2021-02-18 02:47:32
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 12,135
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21503956
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thisbloodycat/pseuds/thisbloodycat
Summary: If only this moment could last forever. The thought did cross Scorpius’ mind once or twice. It’s not like he meant it literally! And yet his whole world, adamantly, refuses to stick to his plan.AKA Eff My Life.
Relationships: Scorpius Malfoy/Albus Severus Potter
Comments: 4
Kudos: 11





	1. >.day_count:01

**Author's Note:**

> **Disclaimer:** Harry Potter is owned by J.K. Rowling and Warner Brothers. No copyright infringement intended.

Flickering rays of sunlight come in through the blinds to his room. It must be early: six, seven at most. Albus lies quietly beside him, still asleep—no wonder really, considering they went to bed past two a.m. Scorp’s sheets cover his thighs. It’s not like it matters, not after last night. Scorp did get rather well acquainted with them, wrapped around his hips…

He’d spent over a year half-panicked Al might hate him, yet seeing Al standing at his door yesterday kind of sent all that to hell. Scorp tries, vainly, to pause the smile curling up his lips. He shouldn’t be anywhere near this pleased, but he is. It turns out Al doesn’t hate him, can’t hate him. Indeed, he’s still here. That _has_ to count for something.

Scorp runs a hand up Albus’ back. And to think that a few hours ago, he would have gladly given half his fortune and more to be able to have this again: Albus, back with him. Lying next to Scorpius, Al’s skin is perfect gold against dark bedding, naked; nipples pink and erect, a tempting contrast to the sweet paleness of his own. It feels warm under his palm, more alive than anything he’s touched. Scorp almost wants to lick it, taste it to make sure that this is Al here, not someone else. But then Albus shivers a little. His eyelids flutter.

He’s awake.

“Hey,” Al says. His eyes shine green, as bright as ever.

“Hey,” Scorp says too, brushing Al’s fringe out of his face. He’s lost, he’s so freaking lost he can’t even see north anymore. All he sees here is Albus. He kisses him lightly on the cheek; doesn’t know what’s good, what’s not. It’s been such a long time since they’ve done any of this. It’s all new to him, or at least relatively new. Al gasps, however, when Scorp’s mouth moves down to his neck, and that’s encouraging. Encouraging enough that the next kiss is longer, far more intent—lips on lips, slow and careful, shy and tender, like leaving innocence behind. Scorpius catches himself thinking, _It_ _’s not like either of us can have much left of that anyway_.

Then, the door bangs open and Al gasps again. Only this time, it’s not the good kind, rather the panicked kind. Scorpius doesn’t even get to turn around. A hand closes on his hair, pulling hard. The blunt point of a wand digs into one of his shoulders.

He tries to free himself, to reach for his wand.

But it’s too late. It’s too far. The room goes black around him, ceases to exist. There’s only darkness, unending darkness. Darkness and Al’s green eyes in it, staring right into his heart.

* * *

He’s tied to a chair when he wakes up. One side of his head hurts quite a lot—bruised, he’s guessing. Either that or they cleaned up prettily, what with the amount of blood vessels carry up there. Head injuries bleed a great deal, that much he remembers reading back when the world was a nice place still worth living in. Pretty different from what it is these days.

“Al?”

No sound. No motion, no…

Absolutely nothing.

His chair clatters horribly as Scorp tries to turn it, his own breathing coming out quite heavy. It’s hard to move when his legs are tied to it. Behind his back, something zips his wrists together. It’s made of a soft material and feels warm against his skin. Plastic, rather than metal. He’s still in his pyjama bottoms, which sadly means his wand is not on him. There’s a blurry shape behind him though, too close to tell who it is. Scorp’s guess is it might be Al, only he seems to be dressed now, and that’s a bit odd, isn’t it? He certainly wasn’t, back upstairs.

“That bloke you fried earlier with your spell…” a woman’s voice comes through the door, spewing tears and murder.

“I’m sorry,” a man says. “I… Look, he came out of nowhere! His wand was pointed at—” There’s a loud thud out there. A slap, a punch, _something_.

“He was my friend, you twat!” the woman screams.

It sounds like they’re fighting. That may be good for him and Al—at least it should buy them some time. If their luck holds, perhaps it’ll be enough to free themselves and walk out of here.

“Albus?!” he tries again. There’s a groaned answer this time, definitely in Albus’ voice. If one forgets last night, it’s been longer than a year since Scorp last heard his voice. Admittedly he’s forgotten much—all he had left were his own memories—yet the exact ring of Al’s tone is still etched into them, like a firebrand snatched from glowing coal. “Al, are you all right?”

“I think so…”

“What do you think they want?”

“How… should I… know?” Al pants, clearly struggling with his bonds. “This is _your_ house, not mine.”

Scorp can almost taste Al’s resentment in his words. He hasn’t mentioned it, Al hasn’t either, but they used to live together. They don’t anymore. And Al… honestly, if this is anything to go by, Al doesn’t seem too pleased about it. Scorp is nearly stumbling on the edge of an apology, ready to say something, anything that might wear this down. But then the door opens fully. Three people come in, all wearing masks.

“You can call me Mr Fox,” one of them grunts. Scorpius chokes down a nervous laugh. It’s fitting, oddly enough, since that’s what his mask is: the head of a fox.

“What do you want?” It turns out asking isn’t exactly the best of choices. All Scorpius gets from it is a sock to the jaw, from the nice lady standing with them. The nice lady who’s actually not too nice, but rather coarse. He’s thinking she might have been the one who dragged him downstairs—no wonder all his limbs ache! Nearly as much as they did when Al’s brother broke his arm back in second year, and Madam Pomfrey made him swallow a whole bowl of Skele-Gro.

“Speak only when spoken to,” Mr Fox spits. Scorpius spits, too: blood at his feet. Orders, as if he’s here to follow them. In his own house.

“I can’t find anything worth taking here,” the third one says, the one with the mouse-shaped mask. He sounds far younger than the other two, barely a kid.

“There’s no need to rush. We’ll ask him later, but let’s eat first,” says the woman. “This bloke has a fucking kitchen-garden, can you believe that?”

“We shouldn’t linger here too long,” the fox-faced one says. “Who knows if—”

“Oh, come on! We haven’t eaten properly in days…”

“Besides—” the woman pulls Scorp’s head back painfully, her hand tearing hard on his hair, “—it’s not like this one here can go anywhere.”

Grinning up at her is easy, only now it holds a daring edge of ill-will. Whatever it is they’re doing here, Scorp will make sure they pay for it. Gladly and dearly.

“Okay. Alright,” Mr Fox finally says after quite a bit of thinking. “You go first, I’ll be there in five.”

The metal door to Scorp’s lab clanks closed behind their backs. Mr Fox is still here, watching Al. His hand, Scorp guesses by the angle, must be touching Albus’ neck, caressing it or…

It can’t be strangling him. Al is too quiet; Fox’s muscles look far too lax for strength to be present in whatever he’s doing. He must be doing _something_ though, there’s no doubt. An odd possessiveness wakes up inside Scorpius, one he wasn’t even aware of having. It rather stuns him when he hears himself grumbling, “You touch him, I’ll make sure to tear you apart before you get to leave this place.”

Fox’s hand drops. Scorp can’t help being glad, a small cheer of triumph building up inside him. He’s partly ashamed Al saw that too, but one can’t have it all.

“Tell me where you keep them,” Mr Fox asks.

“Where I keep what?” Scorp drawls. “You might need to be a bit more specific here. I have no clue what you’re looking for.”

“You know what I’m looking for. I’m warning you, you hold back on me—” Fox pulls Al’s chair in front of him. Of course he does, because that’s what keeps happening whenever Scorp lets his feelings out. Bloody hell, he should have learnt that much by now! As it turns out, he hasn’t. Not at all. “—you’ll get to watch me have some fun with your mate here.”

Al raises his head. He looks minutely at Scorp. His chin is held high, but fear glints cold in his eyes.

* * *

“Who are they?”

Scorp shrugs slowly. “I’ve no clue. They must have followed you last night.”

“No one followed me, Scorp. I made sure.”

“No one else _knew_ I was here.” Al showed up late last night. Early this morning, these mysterious people decided they might as well drop by. Scorpius is many, many things, but last time he checked, ‘a total dunce’ was nowhere on that list. He highly doubts it’s included now. Plus, it’s not like it’s _too_ hard to connect the dots here. “You were the only one who knew.”

“What? Hey, I didn’t plan to… You left me a riddle, for Salazar’s sake!” For a moment there, Al’s face sways between anger and confusion. Morosely enough, he seems to settle on the one Scorpius likes less. He could have dealt with confusion, it’s far easier than anger. “A bloody _riddle_. I didn’t get sorted into Ravenclaw, you did!”

There’s a wistful pull in Scorp’s stomach. Al’s words sound bitter, furious. Furious at him, and Merlin knows he deserves it greatly.

“Do you even know how long it took me to figure out what any of it meant?”

“Shhh,” Scorp hisses. He’s trying to drag his chair near the table. There’s a pocket knife in one of the drawers there—shame he can’t _Accio_ it as he has no wand. Al’s hollering though, it will just make them come back faster.

“Months! It took me months to figure it out, and way more than months to figure out _how_ to place any of those numbers so they made sense!”

“Yell a bit louder, will you?” Scorp drawls. It’s not his fault it comes out sarcastic, more his father’s fault, and perhaps where he grew up. He nods towards the door. “I don’t think they’ve quite heard you yet.”

“I came here for you,” Al grouses, albeit quietly now. “You gave me your coordinates, and I came. Isn’t that enough? What more do I have to do to earn your—”

“I know you did.”

“You’re not even grateful!”

“I am, I really am. Look, I’m sorry,” Scorp mumbles, and he is. He truly is. It’s not like he spews apologies here and there just to seem kinder. He’s just nervous, nervous as a long-tailed Kneazle standing in a room full of rocking chairs. But it’s not Al who’s making him jumpy—though he’ll grant he’s rather nervous _over_ Al, over what might happen to him if they come back and Scorpius is still stuck to this flipping chair. Admitting that much, however, won’t help them get out of here sooner. “It’s not your fault, all right?” Of course it is, he should have checked better. It just won’t do any good to make Al feel more guilty than he already does and, honestly, he’s looking rather sheepish. “I know that.”

“What are you doing? Why are you—”

“They must have had you under surveillance, back then,” Scorp mutters. He’s almost managed to get the drawer open, perhaps if he leans a bit more against the table. He’s got to be careful here: if he falls, there’s no way up. “I should have known, should have thought of that before…”

“What?” Al’s brows furrow. “Wait, what did you… Who was watching me?”

Scorpius sighs. Groans. Strains against the table. “Bollocks,” he snaps, to nothing and no one in particular, except perhaps at himself since he’s failing miserably here. He presses the knife between drawer and table, trying to get it to stand straight. It keeps bending to one side, slipping, the silly thing…

“Salazar, what on Earth are you doing back there?” Al asks, panic obvious in his voice. “You’re going to get us both killed!”

“I’m trying to”—he swings up and down as much as the ropes let him. Which, admittedly, is not a great deal—“cut my handcuffs.” Merlin, he’s so done with this.

At last, the sharp edge of the blade cuts cleanly through the plastic, miraculously leaving his hands untouched. After freeing himself, Scorpius picks them from the ground. “Flex-cuffs. I knew it.”

“Be careful,” Al says when he approaches him. “I don’t want—”

“I _am_ being careful,” Scorp breaks in. It’s not like he wants to cut off Al’s hands. At least Al should know that much. Especially after last night. “Stay put, we don’t have much time.”

“Time?” Al’s head tilts to one side. “Time for what exactly? What are you planning to—”

“Those fellows out there, it’s not my cash they’re after.”

“What?” Al’s grip on his wrist tightens to the point where pain makes a sudden appearance.

“I was working on something when I left. Something quite—” Scorpius eyes shift to one side, “—relevant.”

“What were you working on?”

“Albus.” Scorpius kneels in front of him. “Listen to me, please.” He’s trying to sound calm here, though he’s not even remotely close to calm himself. He just wants Al to stop jumping up walls out of nerves, and right now Al’s looking rather close to it. “There’s three of them out there”—three that Scorp has seen so far, but there could be more. More he hasn’t seen. Best not to tell Al that, he seems frightened enough as it is—“and they’ve got wands. We need to get out of here. All right?”

Al’s hand loses strength. He finally lets go of Scorp’s arm. Scorp can see him swallow, think. But then Al gives him a slight nod. “Fine,” Al mumbles. “How?”

Scorp runs both hands over Al’s shoulders, smiling up at him. He pulls him down, close for a kiss. Al’s lips open obediently under his, at least until Al wrinkles his nose and pulls away.

“Ugh, you taste like blood,” he mutters.

Scorp can’t hold back the shaky laughter escaping his mouth. “You don’t say,” he quips, what with the slap he got before.

Still, he can’t help feel outrageously relieved. This is Al, perfectly back in shape. They’re finally past the fear, now action comes and that’s good. Great, even. It’s not that Scorpius is fantastic at it—he’s great at reading books, building up on theories and crafting new spells, at being productive and keeping to-do lists he follows endlessly and, obviously, at being ridiculously fond of Al and rarely letting it show. And if he’s completely honest here, he’s been missing that last bit a lot. Almost as much as he’s been missing Al.

Sadly though, none of those things are involved in getting out of this room. But at least he handles action better than this whole ‘woe feelings’ bit: he’s crap at that, he’s always been and he knows it. The worst part is he’s pretty sure Al knows it too.

They used to date after all.

* * *

Scorp peers furtively through the minuscule slot between door and wall. There’s one of them outside, still wearing a mask. After some time though, watching and watching wears him out. He takes a few steps towards Al then; it’s not like the bloke out there seems to be going anywhere, anytime soon. Pointing at the corpse lying between them, he asks, “Do you know him?”

Al turns the carcass over with a shove of his foot, takes a slight peek and grimaces. No wonder, he’s burnt all over. “No,” comes Al’s answer. “Should I?”

 _Maybe_ , Scorp thinks. _You were there too_. “I think he’s one of the Aurors that tried to arrest me.”

Al doesn’t answer. Just looks at him weirdly and wanders off, glancing at the massive stacks of books Scorp has piled all over his laboratory. “Quite a bit of reading you’ve been doing…”

With a tiny shrug, Scorp says, “I’ve had plenty of time.” Plenty of time to keep his mind busy, plenty of time to blame himself. Plenty of time to try and locate Al, and plenty of time to fail and keep failing.

At least Al is here now. That’s nice, isn’t it? He made it all the way here, all by himself. Quite sad he also got followers along the way. Scorpius gazes back at him. One of Al’s hands is reaching out to touch—oh, dear. “Don’t! Stop!”

Al pauses, arm up in the air. He looks back at Scorp wearing that face, the one he always makes when he knows he’s done something wrong. Merlin, as if it were _needed_ at this point, when Scorp’s shame is burning his insides. Already making him regret it came out as an order when it was just… a plea. A plea for caution he completely, absolutely, utterly messed up. “Just…” He pauses, chewing on his lip. To be honest, his social skills have never been what one would call amazingly good, but after a whole year spent alone… Well, it’s not exactly unexpected they’ve taken a large step backwards, is it? “Just try not to touch that.”

“All right.” Al pulls his hand back. “How come?”

“It’s rigged with curses. I reckon that’s how he—” Scorp nods towards the corpse, “—got killed.”

These are all suppositions, obviously: it’s not like he’s ever seen this happening before. Sadly, he suspects his conjectures are accurate in this particular situation, given the position of the remains and… where they’re lying. There’s a brief moment of discomfort when he notices one of the dead body’s hands is gone. Missing. Likely the one he lifted to touch his experiment. Perhaps Scorp did go a bit overboard with the curses. Well. At least they worked? The dead bloke there seems really rather… belly up, brown bread. Come to a sticky end. One would say food for worms. And Scorp is—indirectly, but still—the one who did him in.

It’s a bit shocking, all in all. He shudders. A first is a first. No one’s ever tried to touch any of his experiments before—but then again, no one at the Department of Mysteries would even dare to, and it’s not like anyone else has managed to find him since he ran away. He’s good at that, at being invisible. He has been doing it all his life, even when he was just a child.

His father warned him once, the day before he took the Hogwarts Express. “They all know who you are. They all know what I’ve done. They won’t be kind to you, keep that in mind.” Scorp listened as usual, as always. His father had been right then, but then was a long time ago. Back then, his father stood on a brightly lit pillar. He’s been off that pillar for a while. Pretty much since he became Minister.

Scorp blinks away from his thoughts, staring at the polished wooden base of his experiment up there. “Just don’t touch it,” he tells Al, again.

Al stares up at it too, unblinking and unmoving. Eventually he asks, “What is it?”

“It’s nothing, really. Just an experiment I was working on, back when…” He catches himself scratching his stubble, not quite voluntarily. Looks at Al for a couple of seconds. _Back when I screwed things up with you_. It’s quite a marvel he somehow managed to bite that last bit down before it came out. “It’s sort of a Time-Turner.”

Al’s eyebrows rise. “Doesn’t even look like the one dad showed me in his memories. I thought they were much smaller.”

“Yes, well.” Likely because it’s not a Time-Turner. It’s just an experiment, and one gone wrong at that. “I think that may be what they’re after, the blokes out there.”

“I doubt it.” Al scoffs. “They’re just starving, like everyone else out there.” He points towards the wall, towards the world outside of Scorpius’ comfy hut in the middle of nowhere. “So unless this thing here can marvellously make food out of nothing, I doubt they’d be even remotely—”

“I’m quite sure that is what they’re here for,” Scorpius interrupts, firmly, leaning against the wall with his arms crossed. “The Ministry must have sent them.”

“So this thing here… Is this what you stole from them?”

“I didn’t steal it, Al! I _created_ it! Built it from scratch,” Scorp snaps. “I used to work for them, remember?”

“As if I could forget.” Al frowns a bit. “Well?” 

“Well, what?”

“What’s it supposed to do, this… bunch of irons?”

“Nothing. I already told you.” Scorp tries a shrug; it comes out as awkward as they get. He’s not particularly proud of his failures, and that thing up there is largely one of them. “It was supposed to be a Time-Turner, only not for one person. They wanted it to be able to carry”—armies, he’s pretty sure of that from what he overheard his father’s assistants saying. He’s always been a good listener. Sometimes, even too good—“er, large groups of people. I said I’d work on it but… Look, as far as I know, it’s just a bunch of spells mixed together doing nothing at all.”

Al looks his way, brows knitted. “I don’t get it, why take it then? Why take something that doesn’t even work?” Al doesn’t exactly ask ‘And more than that, why fill it with curses strong enough to blast a man’s hand off his body?’, yet Scorp has no doubt it’s going through his head. It’s definitely going through his own mind, to say the least.

“I don’t know.” He’s not even sure himself. He’s not even sure there was ever a good reason for it: he took it and that’s that. Perhaps he thought they might figure out what he did wrong or something. It was over a year ago, he’d been angry and resentful and overall extremely sceptical over everything he got to hear back at the Ministry. It seemed they were preparing for something big—and indeed, they were. “I took all my work for them, even the scrolls. I even took all my planning, perhaps because I got to see more harm than good coming out of it, long term…”

“And that, ladies and gentlemen,” Al breaks in, “is Scorpius being Scorpius. Ethics first, knowledge second, and anything else way behind on the race,” a praise mocking enough for Scorpius to retort, “Well, you can’t say I was _wrong_ , can you?”

“I’m quite amazed you didn’t end up in Gryffindor. Oh, hang on a second, that’s right. They ask for courage there too, don’t they? And you,” Al says, “have never had any of that.”

As if he has that much himself, the massive plonker. Silence stretches between them. Scorpius turns around, walking back towards the door. There’s no one there now. If he can get out and grab his wand, perhaps…

“What are you planning to do?” asks Al, now standing beside him.

Scorp looks at him, biting his lip thoughtfully. Al’s face slowly turns into a sulk.

“No. Don’t,” Al warns. “Whatever you’re thinking, don’t do it. It’s never good when you…”

Scorp shakes his head. No courage, Al said. Well, he’s going to show him some. “Lock the door behind me, would you?” Scorpius can be brave. In fact, he’s being brave now. “It has the same password as the one on my safe at home.”

“No.” Al grabs his arm, pulling him back. “Scorp, don’t go out there, please. I’m begging you.”

“It’s reinforced against curses and spells. It will take them quite a while to break it down. Don’t worry, you’ll be perfectly fine in here.” At least for a short while. It’s quite a shame the walls are blocked against magic, quite a shame Scorpius obviously forwent making an alternative exit to the lab. Then again, if he had and they’d found it, they’d just have locked them somewhere else, so…

“You don’t get it, do you? They’ll kill you if they see you out of here,” Al pleas. It’s sweet of him, it’s nice. So nice indeed that Scorp decides to throw his scruples to the wind.

He kisses Al, lazy and tentative. At least he deserves this much, regardless of what he’s done in the past, regardless of Al’s mocking attempts at his lack of bravery for leaving him behind. Al doesn’t know the full details. He doesn’t know there was no time to come up with a plan, that Scorp had under five minutes to get out of the Ministry after setting off the alarm. Besides, this might be the last time he gets to do this. To kiss Al.

Pressure comes back just right when Scorp opens his mouth, just like it did last night: soft pressure on his tongue. Merlin, he’s missed this so, so much. He rests a hand on Al’s chest, slowly moving it up to his jaw.

Scorp leaves it there when he pulls back, gently caressing Al’s skin. Al seems contemplative, a little withdrawn.

“I shouldn’t have left you that riddle, Al.”

“What?” Al blinks. Then his eyes rest on Scorp’s, brows furrowed upwards. “Don’t say that, I’m glad you left something.”

“No, it was…” Stupid. “I just… thought I might miss you. I _did_ miss you, you know?” He rests his forehead against Al’s, sighing. This could be the last time, and as a goodbye it’s not even a good one. Yet Scorpius pushes himself on, “It was a mistake, _my_ mistake. I should have left nothing, no good has come of it after all.”

“It _has_!” Al looks at him like he’s crazy, like he’s out of his mind. But then again, Al knows nothing. “I’m here! I couldn’t have found you without…”

Scorpius looks into his eyes. _Yes, you_ _’re here, but you might not be here for too long_. Then, he gazes at the door. It’s really for the best if Al comes out alive, it’s not like it matters if Scorp doesn’t. No one counts on Scorpius, not anymore. He’s dead to them—or worse, one of Father’s lackeys, given that his dear dad never released the news. Too much of a shame to admit even his own son betrayed him, he reckons.

Al though, Al has friends. He still has a family who cares about him.

“Stay here,” Scorp whispers. The sad part here is Al did count on him. Al actually _cared_ about him, for some absurdly idiotic reason pulled out of some bizarre corner of his mind. And Scorpius still left him behind like the muppet he is, the muppet he’s always been. He’s spent so many months regretting that, trying to find Al and failing, again and again. “And use the locking password when I’m gone. You remember it, don’t you?”

“That’s a silly question. Of course I remember it.” Scorp has to grant him that. The day they started dating. What can he say, he’s sentimental about some things, Al being obviously one of them. It’s such a shame they being together again only lasted a few hours…

Still, it made Scorp happy. It made him pleased. Though perhaps it doesn’t have to be over yet, not if he manages to do things right this time. He hears Al’s voice behind him as he leaves. “Don’t go, please. Stay here with me.” There’s a certain degree of despair in it.

Still, he’s not going to give Al more reasons to hate him. He’s going to do things right this time.

* * *

Scorpius watches them, crouching behind one of the desks in his kitchen. Sadly, it’s as far as he can get. The stairs are across the room, going out through the other door. If only he could cross it without his intruders seeing him, he might be able to go up to his bedroom and fetch his wand. They’ve all got working eyes though, and it’s not like Scorp can make himself invisible out of the blue. Al’s father used to have a cloak that did that, but then again—he can’t stop a grimace from covering his face—he’s been long dead. Scorp’s father took care of him, and he took care of him far before senior Potter could even raise a movement against Britain’s new magic jurisdiction.

The intruders must have gone through his house. They’re listening to the news programme, so they must have managed to find his wireless. Voices come and go, that thing’s been broken for ages. Scorpius has never been too bothered by it to try to fix it. _What for_ , he wonders, _when it_ _’s far better to pretend the whole world has gone to hell_.

“Many wizards in the UK celebrate the government’s reunification,” says the newscaster before her voice flutters into nothing; a woman clearly paid by his father to read that particular scroll. Father used to tell him, “Money makes the world go ’round.” Scorpius has to grant him that at least that much he’s proven. More than, even.

“… treaty has been signed to start a war against all opponents of the new regime,” the wireless announces a while later. Not that Scorpius paying it much attention, he’s far more interested in watching his intruders: their masks are off now.

… _magical division destroyed by a Muggle missile_ …

Upon hearing that one of his intruders—the young one with the mouse mask—happens to snort. “Sure, a Muggle missile…”

When he turns around to watch him, Scorpius barely stops himself from recoiling. He knows him. He’s seen him before, four years ago… Scamander, wasn’t he? A few years below him and Al at Hogwarts. He had a twin, too. Scorpius could never tell them apart: they were identical copies of each other, those two, the one large difference between them being the colours shining on their ties. That, and that the Hufflepuff one never managed to get the knot tied right. Seeing it messed up every day kept making Scorpius itch inside, perfect things not quite as perfect as they should be.

“Merlin’s sake, don’t listen to her. It’s all lies. As if anything the Ministry of Magic says has the slightest bit of truth to it.” It must be Fox the one who answers, mostly by the clothes on him. “You keep listening to their propaganda and one day you’ll fall for it, just you wait.” He points at the audio broadcaster. Scorpius squints, paying attention. He can hear people in the background, all of them screaming his father’s motto. A demonstration, maybe? “Listen to them! They all bought his barmy lies. How’s _that_ for our dodgy new Minister, huh?”

The woman scoffs. “Know thy enemy, pal. Know thy enemy.” Scorpius has no clue who she is, but her hair is as red as the one the Granger-Weasley brat had. He never liked her much. For some odd reason, he’s not much liking this one either—and perhaps his reason here might be related to the massive punch she gave him when he was tied up back in the lab.

“Yeah, well, it’s not like—”

Fox breaks in then, “You cut that into _five_ pieces?”

The other bloke—Lorcan, Lysander, whatever he’s called—nods.

“There’s only _three_ of us now, you prat,” Fox chides, slapping the back of Scamander’s head. “The other two got killed, knock a bell that?”

Scorpius cranes his neck in concentration. So there’s only three of them now, no more, and they all happen to be standing in this room. None of them is watching him; none of them is watching Al. Rather dreadful at this whole ‘intruding’ thing, aren’t they? Then, he notices Scamander, leaving his wand on the table, likely to be able to grab Scorp’s piece of pie with both hands. Scorp can’t help rolling his eyes—Merlin, he must be the Hufflepuff one, who else would leave his wand on the nearest table just to be able to grasp his food better? But then it dawns on him: the wand is in reach. One of Scorpius’ eyebrows rises. Just a couple of steps, and it’s his. Could he get there before they…

Scorpius launches for it. Crashes against the table on his way there, but somehow, he manages to grab the wand before it falls to the floor. “ _Protego_!” he yells. “ _Petrificus Total_ —”

Something thuds against his head. The room trembles—no, it’s not the room, it’s him. Is he… falling? The whole kitchen tilts to one side. His head crashes painfully against the ground.

_… do not listen to the mad words of a wise woman…_

For a mere second, Scorpius almost feels like chuckling at himself. He must be mad, too. Acting too quickly, disregarding even the consequences of his own actions, thinking he could kill the three of them far before any of them reacted.

The world trembles yet again when his skull hits the floor. He must have moved the wireless, it seems to be repeating the same sentence over and over.

 _… mad words_ … _listen to the mad words_ …

He turns his head to look up. The woman is frowning down at him. Metal clatters as she picks up one of his frying pans.

_… the eternal hourglass of existence is turned upside down, again and again…_

The woman lifts the pan.

_… and along with it, you are too…_

Watching the pan sway down towards his head, before the ear-splitting crash he foresees rattling his bones and brain in equal measure, the last thought crossing Scorp’s mind is, _You failed him. You failed him, yet again_. Because failing Al is all he’s ever managed. Failing at things he promised, failing at keeping him safe.


	2. >.day_count:02

Flickering rays of sunlight come in through the blinds to his room. It must be early: six, seven at most. Albus lies beside him quietly, still asleep. And all this is wrong; all this cannot be happening again, not when it’s the exact same moment he lived yesterday. Even his own mind is blinking, quite perplexed. _I should be dead_ , it keeps screaming at him. He glances at the door, worried. It will bang open any minute now. Three people will come in, all masked. The exact same three ones he saw yesterday.

Merlin.

Ten seconds pass. Indeed, the door bangs open.

This time he gets to see them. Fox pauses for a moment, staring at Al, who knows why.

And then it all happens as it did.

“You left me a riddle,” Al yells at him, exactly like he did yesterday, “a bloody _riddle_ like the Ravenclaw you are!” Only yesterday is not yesterday, as it now seems to be today.

Scorpius can’t help chuckling at all this, it’s so absurd.

Is it a dream? Is he still asleep upstairs, lying in bed, dreaming this whole madness here? Oh my. Perhaps Al never found him. Perhaps he dreamt it all, perhaps he never shagged Al, a wet dream gone wrong. Yes. Yes, it _has_ to be a dream. Absolutely—an icy shudder crawls through him—and a really bad one at that. One that ends with him dying.

For a brief moment there he remembers Divination, that blatantly pointless subject he only took because Al wanted to and his pity face did truly bad things to Scorp’s heart, things he’s not even going to mention—it’d be admitting to all these inconvenient feelings he has when Al is within the equation.

“Dreaming of death just means a fresh start in life,” Brown, his teacher, said one day. “It’s the symbolic end of something, such as a job, a relationship.”

Only, his job died quite a while ago, and he’s been hoping here for nearly _forever_ to somehow _revive_ his last relationship, for Merlin’s sake. She did mention dreaming of pets dying, of seeing your mother dead. Oddly enough, what she never mentioned was dreaming of having been _murdered_. Honestly, if McGonagall was still alive, he’d owl her. Ask her to include that in the subject’s planning—either that, or fire Brown, the great liar.

“What are you doing?” Al asks.

Oh my, oh my. It’s like the wrong version of _Cluedo_ : Miss Red Haired, in the kitchen, with one of Scorpius’ frying pans. He swallows queasily. It’s just, it all felt so _real_. Like it was actually _happening_. He can still remember the texture of the wood against his fingers, he remembers the texture of Al’s skin. The granite tiles of the kitchen floor dragging against the back of his head when he looked up. He’s concentrating so hard on that, he doesn’t even feel his chair slipping. The plastic of his flex-cuffs is still uncut. He can’t hold himself up. His head knocks against the desk, or is it his pocket knife? Ugh, the bloody knife that wouldn’t stand straight. In any case, whatever it is that hit his head, it leaves him blinking and half-deaf, half-dead and half-empty.

He looks up at Al for a second, distress heavily painted on Al’s face. Well, at least someone here still feels something for him, something Scorpius himself is not currently feeling.

All he sees before the world fades out is Al’s feet running towards him.


	3. >.day_count:03

Flickering rays of sunlight come in through the blinds to his room… yet _again_. Albus lies beside him quietly, bloody hell, still asleep. Is time repeating itself? It can’t be. It can’t—it’s not even _possible_!

Yet it has to be. It _must_ be.

Still, Scorp can’t help blinking when the door bangs open. There’s a queasy feeling in his stomach that won’t go away, no matter what. Three of them come in, all masked. It all happens just like it did yesterday, like it did two days ago, and it’s mad, it’s _insane_. That’s what it is. _No no no_ , his mind keeps saying, mixed with screams of, _Not this! Not again!_ In fact, the only difference is this time he lasts a teeny bit longer.

If he’s honest here, it doesn’t matter much. It’s not like he manages to get them out.

Now, this is a shocking surprise: Fox kills him in the end. This time Scorp gets to see Al pushing Fox back. Al yelling at him, “What have you done? How could you?”

Meanwhile, Scorp’s legs stop working. They bend at the knees for some odd reason, likely having to do with whatever spell Fox used. He falls sideways to the floor. Somehow, the air smells of smoke; where it’s coming from, Scorpius has no cue. He beams his most sarcastic smile at the complete madness his life is lately.

 _Look at the bright side_ , his mind says; the bright side here clearly being that he’s finally figured something out: time is really repeating itself, for some absurd reason he doesn’t quite get. There’s another side though, and he has to admit it’s not quite as bright: Morning, Mr Death. Haven’t seen you since yesterday. Thanks. You’re welcome.


	4. >.day_count:05

“Al,” he says, shaking Al’s shoulder, “wake up.” Merlin Al, _please_ , fire and brimstone and hellfire, nether agony and trials to come, “Wake the hell up!”

Al blinks up at him, quite sleepy. “Wha—”

“Come on! Come on, get the hell up,” Scorp hisses. “They’re coming!”

“What?” Al sits up. One of his hands hovers over his mouth, likely stifling a yawn. “What do you mean with that, who’s coming?”

“Merlin, Al… _them_!” Scorpius yells, raising his hands. He’d raise them higher, but that’s as far as they’d go. Factoring limits, derivative touched. “The _intruders_!”

Al blinks at him again, confusion spraying on his face. The door bangs open. Three people step in, all wearing masks.

 _Seriously, mate. Again?_ Scorp’s eyes roll hard, all while thinking, _Piss. Off. Already._

If only Al had woken faster, if only. They could at least have made it through the window. But now it’s too late. This time, he even offers his wrists to Miss Coarse. What does it matter when the moment is gone.

* * *

“Dare touch him and you die,” Scorp says, admittedly rather bored with it himself. He’s really trying his best to go with it, but this is the fifth day. Honestly, the _fifth day_.

And it’s getting quite annoying to have to live yet again through all this bollocks.

“Look at that,” Mr Fox tells the woman, whoever she is. “Menacing little shit, ain’t he?”

Whatevs, mate. If his boredom here passes as threat for Mr Fox, Merlin shall let him believe in lies, no matter how gigantically massive they are. Scorpius tries his hardest not to yawn while they yadda yadda at each other—for Morgana’s sake, let them go eat already! By the time they are done, two of them leave, Fox being the only one left behind. “Where do you keep them?”

“Keep what?” Scorp retorts. “It’s been five days, and I still have literally no clue what on Earth you’re looking for here.” Well, he has to grant Mr Fox a prize there: for a brief moment, he does look slightly confused.

Sadly, he recovers quickly enough.

“You know what we’re looking for,” Fox says, as if it’s that obvious and Scorpius is clearly obtuse for not seeing it. But seeing _what_ , exactly? Scorpius wonders, _What am I supposed to see here?_ Merlin, it’s as he’s reading a script or something. And, honestly, it might be: it’s all going just as it did the last four times it happened.

“No, I don’t. I don’t, and you won’t fucking _say_.” In fact, the only difference Scorp sees here is Fox being a tiny bit more daring. Maybe?

“If you dare hold back on me when I come back,” he’s saying now, and this time he’s decided to add in a sickening lick to one side of Al’s face. Something evil grumbles inside Scorpius, something a lot like envy, and mine, mine, _mine_. “You’ll get to watch him suffer.”

“Don’t worry. Eventually, I’ll get to watch _you_ suffer,” Scorpius mutters to the man-slaughtering machine, like his friend the lass. All of them killing machines, all of them aimed at Scorpius, the sad part here being he doesn’t even know _why_ they’re constantly trying to put him to death. He’s just been living his life, alone, not bothering anyone at all, for Merlin’s sake! “Just you wait.”

Once Fox leaves, Al predictably turns to him. “Who are they?”

Scorpius, rather predictably too, he reckons, ignores him. He’s sick of all this: sick of this talk, sick of explaining all and getting nothing at all.

“Scorp?” Al says, brows furrowed. Only, Scorp cares very little right now. He thinks he may be bordering on nothing. In fact, he’s just going to keep pretending Al is definitely _not_ here until his freaking cuffs are gone.

“Hey!” Al yells. Whatever. What’s the worst thing that can happen here? Scorpius dies, and voilà, they all come back safe and sound. “Stop that,” Al begs. “They’ll hear you! They’ll come back and…”

Scorpius pauses. “I highly doubt it,” he obnoxiously drawls. “In fact, I think we have plenty of time.”

Al gapes at him. “What?” He too recovers quite quickly, since the next thing he says is, “Merlin, Scorp, you’re going to get us both killed…”

“Albus, listen to me. Right now, this very moment,” he explains rather tiredly, while he finally cuts through the plastic of Al’s flex-cuffs. They’re really rather tight. It’s quite a wonder Al’s fingers work, still moving despite the pressure. “All of this has happened before.”

Al, in turn, stares up at him, like he’s a bright pink unicorn grazing contentedly in a grassy pasture. Surrounded by all the others. The normal ones, the ones with white manes and white tails. Still, Scorpius keeps trying, “Four times already, I think.”

Al shakes his head. “What are you talking about?”

“You don’t remember, do you?” Scorpius inhales deeply.

Al just sits there, doing nothing at all. A stray strand of his fringe falls softly over his face. Scorpius’ hands aren’t itching to touch it, not at all. He just breathes out slowly through his mouth.

“No, obviously, you don’t. Of _course_ you don’t. Bloody hell,” Scorp mutters. He takes a breath to say something, explain, but what can he say that Al would even consider believing? He stares at the door instead. It’s silent there now, they must have moved to the kitchen. He scans the room, trying to find something useful here. He could take his pocket knife—in fact, why didn’t he take it before? More weapons, certainly not a bad idea. Right?

It’s Al’s question that pulls him out of his thoughts. “What’s going through your mind?”

“Nothing, really. I’m trying to figure out how to get us out of here.” Then he adds, rather mockingly, “You could help, you know?”

Al shakes his head. Again. “You’re just going to get us both killed…”

Scorp does try to keep it back, but a massive snort escapes him: Al has said that before, at least six times already. The bloody script for today is driving Scorpius madder than mad. “Me, likely. You, on the other hand,” he sneers, “I doubt it.” It’s the pain shining in Al’s eyes that forces Scorp to backtrack a little, “Not that I want you to get hurt. I don’t want—I’d never…”

He thinks he can see a shade of doubt growing in Al’s eyes, but then again, maybe all he’s seeing there is his own reflection. Himself doubting himself. Hilarious, isn’t it? After all, he’s already tried to explain all this before, Al didn’t buy it, and it ended up with Scorp dead.

“All right,” Scorpius starts, trying to call patience to him. “There’s three of them out there.” There used to be five, but two of them are dead and gone: one of them killed by either Fox or Scamander; the other one, by Scorp’s Time-Turner experiment. “They’ve all got wands and they’re dangerous. You’ll stay here. I doubt they can get through the door before I do them in.”

Or else he’ll die, and the day will restart again, all of them well and peachy; sadly, his intruders included within that metaphor. His life is a bloody nightmare, that’s what it is.

He has to admit this time doesn’t go quite as perfectly as he’d wished. He doesn’t even get to the kitchen. He says the password to the lab door, it obediently slides open, and then magic hits his chest throwing him backwards.

The last thing he sees is the woman’s feet walking towards his face.

“What have you done?” he hears Al yelling at her. “Merlin, why?”

 _Funny that_ , Scorp finds himself thinking, likely because it’s the exact same thing Al asked Mr Fox two days ago, right after Fox decided to do him in by scorching his legs with a spell.

He lets out a massive sigh.

Here comes Death, ready or not. It hardly matters. He’s rather sure he’ll wake up today, again and again and again. Perfect. Unending. Nightmare.


	5. >.day_count:06

Flickering rays of sunlight come in through the blinds to his room. It must be early: six, seven at most. Albus lies beside him, still asleep.

“Indeed,” Scorp drawls quite sarcastically to nothing at all. Or perhaps to time itself and this unending loop he—well, _they_ keep reliving. “Same day, same way.” Scorpius lets out an unending sigh and, picturing drum-rolls within his head, turns around and burrows his face in Albus’ neck. He stays there, nuzzling it quietly. He’s still got a few minutes until the intruders get to his room, best to make good use of them. It’s not like Al will wake fast enough for them to make it through the window anyway, so why on Earth try?

Exactly two minutes later, the door bangs open.

Sigh.

* * *

“Today keeps repeating over and over,” he tells Al, while bowing up and down against the sharp side of his knife, held straight between the drawer’s edge and his desk. He’s getting rather good at this. By now he’s so ridiculously fantastic at it, he can even multitask while doing it: look at him, doing it even while talking. Marvellous, ain’t he? “Come on, Al, _please_ …”

Al says absolutely nothing, just stares at him like he’s mad as a hatter. Scorpius, being honest to himself, ha to admit he’d likely do the exact same, if their positions were reversed. But they’re not. And this crap day is going to be exactly as crapish as yesterday was, and the, what, four days before? Five? Seven? He’s losing count here. Doesn’t even know why he tries to keep it. He rolls his eyes—does it even _matter_ , when he’s the only one aware of this… weird, time-loop thing?

“Please?” he begs. “Tell me you remember yesterday.” Obviously Al remembers crap, Scorp can see that much on his face. But who knows. Perhaps if he begs hard enough, fate will grant him a favour, at flipping last?

“I do remember yesterday,” Al says slowly. “And it looked nothing like today.”

“Come _on_ ,” Scorpius insists. “You _have_ to remember, I can’t be the only one who—look, all this has happened before, you must remember _something_ out of—”

“Er, frankly, Scorp…” Al falters. Keeps staring. “All I can see here is you, clearly dead from the neck up.”

“No. No! No, look, I think… I think it’s my Time-Turner experiment,” Scorp explains. He’s going on a hunch here, hoping it doesn’t sound quite as blatantly insane as it does in his brain. And it really does sound rather mad up there. Still, he’s hoping Al will buy it, mostly because so far it’s all he’s got to sell, and that’s not much, in truth. To begin with, the ‘reasons why’ department seems to be quite lacking. “It must have caused time to loop. We’ve been living and reliving this day for at least—”

“Whoa!” Al stops him. For a moment there, a shiver of understanding sparkles in his eyes, or at least that’s what Scorpius thinks it is. “You,” Al begins, quite sternly, “have completely lost the plot.”

It turns out Scorp was wrong after all, bragging sails forwards while wind clearly blows against them. What he cheerfully took as understanding was really, really not. It’s not like he’s ever been good at reading people, Al being the worst of them—sometimes he even wonders if that’s what pulled them together. But still, his ‘plot’, as Al puts it, is quite clear here, no matter what Al says. It _has_ to be his experiment. Nothing else in this room can affect time in this way, creating a loop out of nothing.

“I haven’t lost anything, all right?” Scorp mutters, because how often does he have to explain this for it to be… Well, it’s likely going to keep being weird as hell, but all he needs here is for Al to _believe_ it, to believe _him_. “My brain is still fine, thank you. We’ve been living this day again and again at least five times, I reckon. Six, in fact, if you add in today.”

“I hope you do realise you’re def talking mental here.”

“No! No, no, no. I still remember them, all right? All those days. I remember every single minute of them.”

There’s a long awkward pause between them. Al flinches for some absurd reason when Scorp moves towards him, as if he thinks he’s going to attack him, and that… that really hurts. Hurts as much as a blow. As if Scorp would even _dare_ harm him, when he’d drop everything and follow Al to the end of the world if needed. Then again, Al might not know that, might not remember—when was the last time Scorp told him? He feels like chuckling at himself for a moment there: placed the title ‘love of his life’ upon Al, the altar of idealism, and then went a broken-hearted man into a long exile without even pausing to explain his motives. Such a (disgraceful) blast his past is.

“Look, these people who came in upstairs,” he begins saying, “I didn’t see them, you must have noticed that much. I had my head—”

“I can assure you, I recall perfectly where you head was,” Al says, blushing quite a bit, “and what you were doing. Let’s just…” He pauses, picking a tiny bit of non-existent dust out of his sweater. “Look, just move forwards…”

“Yes, okay. So, the point is I didn’t see them. You did though, you did see them. One of them is really rather tall. He’s got a large scar across one of his arms. The massive knob calls himself Mr Fox and…”

“You’d have known that anyway.” Al shrugs, waving his hand in the air in dismissal. Seriously, the nerve of him… “You saw him downstairs; he was here a couple of minutes ago.”

“He has a bit of stubble. How would I have noticed that with his mask on, huh?” Scorp adds, awaiting for it to hit. He catches Al’s puzzled look and goes on, “I’m guessing he’s a Metamorphmagus too, his hair keeps changing colour. It was blue when I saw him in the kitchen, but much darker when I saw him—”

“Wait, in the _kitchen_? That’s… that’s not even possible.” Al looks uncertain for a moment. “They covered your face. You can’t have seen him on the way—”

“Not today. I went there five days ago and…” He pauses, looking at Al, Al who’s biting his lip there, looking rather lost. “Never mind. Then there’s a short one, younger than us. I think he went to Hogwarts with us. He had a twin, possibly identical? And I think the one here must be the Hufflepuff one.” No self-assured Ravenclaw would leave his wand unattended on a foreign table. “Scamander.” Just for a moment Al goes still, a dawning focus growing in his eyes. Somehow, seeing it pushes Scorpius to keep talking, “And then there’s a woman with them. Baby-faced, but she a real bulldozer, I’m telling you. She has red hair, red as a Weasley.”

“But how—It’s not even…” Al stammers. “How can you know all that?”

“Because,” Scorp explains, “all this has happened before. This, today, is actually the _sixth time_ it happens. I tried to tell you before, but”—he’s guessing here, by the way Al cringes, that he must have heard perfectly well Scorp’s massive sigh of impatience—“you. Wouldn’t. Listen.”

“Okay. All right, so…” Albus stands up, wandering around his laboratory. “How much can you actually remember of what—”

“Do not touch that,” Scorpius breaks in, basically on repeat. “Please.”

“Oh? How come?”

“Because it would kill you. You see that bloke lying over there?” Upon Al’s nod, he adds, “Well, that—” points at his experiment “—is how he ended up dead. So unless you’re looking for a sweet trip to netherworld paradise, I’d avoid even laying a finger on it.”

Al pulls back his hand, quickly. “What else can you remember?”

“Not much,” Scorpius lies. _Except they_ _’re all trying to kill me_.

“I don’t get it,” Al says, looking quite puzzled. “How come _you_ remember and I don’t?”

“Yes, well, I haven’t figured out that part yet.”

“And what about _them_? Do any of them,” Al asks, pointing at the door, “remember that today is… what? Looping?”

Scorpius shakes his head. “I don’t think so, no.”

_Just me._

He wants to be done with this day. He wants it with the full force of all the books he’s ever read, with his massive pile of embarrassment at having left Al behind, and his never-ending piles of cash withdrawn from Gringotts before any of this happened, and the world went to hell—thanks ever so much, Father, for that last bit. And then he feels even more ashamed of himself. And terribly, terribly lonely. He has to get them both out of here, not just himself. Al came back to him, _for_ him. He’s not leaving him behind. He can’t fail him, not this time.

“Look, Al, you don’t have to believe me. I just really, really need you to trust me for a moment here.” He pauses, swallowing. “Do I at least have that?”

Al gives him a very long look before he scratches his head, peering at Scorp quite seriously. “Fine,” he says. “Let’s say you do.”

Scorpius can’t hold back a sigh. For a moment there, an odd mix of relief and joy seems to be pumping through his heart: this time, he’s sure they’ll make it.

* * *

Scorp peers at them from behind a kitchen cupboard. Al crouches down beside him, looking quite nervous. His intruders seem to be listening to the exact same news programme they had on five days ago.

_… Aurors have been… coalition of terrorists working against the government… you have seen any of these people, please Floo…_

“Keep listening to their propaganda and one day you’ll fall for it too,” Fox says, pointing at the wireless. “You hear all those people in the background? All of them fell for his lies…”

“Know thy enemy, pal. Know thy enemy,” the woman breaks in. “Long term, it will sure save you surprises. Especially,” she adds knowingly, “the nasty ones.”

“Well,” Scamander begins, “it’s not like they’ve found us so far…”

Al picks that moment to whisper into Scorp’s ear, “What’s in all these?”

Scorpius gaze shifts to Al. He’s opened one of Scorpius’ cupboards. There’s a tiny purple bottle in his hand, one of the ones Scorp keeps hidden in the back of the shelf. They’re useful for some experiments—well, _most_ of them, certainly not the one Al’s holding. That one’s only good for killing leprechauns.

“Leave it be. Put it back with the others,” Scorp hisses, but then upon thinking a bit, “No, actually, give it here.” It might not be such a bad idea, after all. Leprechauns are rather similar to people, aren’t they?

Father’s voice comes through the wireless: “Those who forget the past will be condemned to repeat it.” The way he phrases that nearly makes Scorpius chuckle. Isn’t that what Father’s doing, right now? Repeating a war already lost, all while being extremely charming and swaying people over different reasons than the ones Voldemort and Grindelwald used before him. The sad part being he’s got more followers than they ever had. And even sadder is that this time, they may win.

Beside him he sees Al frowning, again. He’s making that face, the one he makes when having thoughts. “It’s poison, isn’t it?” he accuses Scorp. “You’re keeping poison in your kitchen. Merlin, Scorp, that is literally the worst place to keep it. You could kill yourself while cooking…”

_Oh, dear. Not this again_. Best to tune out Al’s musings if all he’s going to rant about is the lack of safety in Scorpius’ kitchen. Scorp sighs, but then he perks up. He’s not really listening to whatever Al says afterwards; he’s quite entertained watching Fox leave the kitchen. At least until Al pulls on his shirt.

“You’re going to kill them, aren’t you?”

Scorpius glances back at him. For some odd reason, Al doesn’t look extremely pleased by his own little discovery.

“You’re going to use it on them,” he says, pointing beyond the desk. “You’re going to poison them, aren’t you?”

“I don’t see why not.” Scorpius shrugs. “They’re here to kill _us_ , remember?”

Al shudders. “You don’t know that, you can’t possibly know that…”

“Really. And you’re telling me this,” Scorp deadpans, “after they’ve already killed me five flipping—”

“They would _not_! They…” Al shakes his head. “You must have done something for them to—”

“Er, news flash here, Al. They did kill me, and several times.” Frankly, if it had been once, Al’s reasoning might as well pass as truth, but not for _five whole days_. Unless really bad luck is playing too, Al’s reasoning here is maddest than mad.

Al bites his lip, looking rather uncertain for a moment.

“I’m going to grab that aerosol can up there,” Scorpius says, “and then I’m going to throw this potion”—the one his hand is shaking—“at one of them. Whoever happens to be closer. Meanwhile, I want you to grab Scamander’s wand”—nods at the table—“and cast _Protego_ on us, all right?”

Al stares at him, quite dubious. “Can _Protego_ even shield us from a potion?”

“It will from this one,” Scorp says, distractedly looking through the shelf. He can’t see the woman anywhere. Then again, he can’t remember seeing her leave the room either, she must be somewhere inside the kitchen, quite a shame he can’t see the whole room from where they are. “Are you ready?”

“No,” Al answers. “I just…” Al stares at the bottle in Scorp’s hand, but then he shakes his head again. “Merlin, is it at least painless?”

Scorpius’ eyes shift to one side. He doesn’t want to lie to him, not again. Instead he goes with, “It’s… quick?” Because… well, because at least that much is true. “Ready?”

_… the eternal hourglass of existence…_

Al glances back at Scorp, doubt still clouding his eyes.

_… what happened to the wizards in Cambridge will happen to all of us if we don’t react both soon and forcefully. Muggles want us dead. Magic has no place in their…_

At last, Al nods.

“On the count of three,” Scorp says. One—he holds one finger up—two. He inhales deeply. Does his part when he reaches three. Meanwhile, Al reaches for the wand and obediently casts a _Protego_.

Scamander, a few feet away, starts trembling. Yells louder than a banshee, and it’s great, it’s perfect. For Merlin’s sake, they’re _finally_ getting somewhere here.

_… the only species left for them to destroy is none other than ourselves…_

Scamander falls to the ground. His head bangs on the way against one side of the table, hard enough for Scorpius to grimace while watching it—that must have hurt. Still, no time to stand around doing nothing: he looks around the kitchen. Can’t see the woman anywhere, she must have left while he and Al were talking. Well, at least there’s only two left now. Definitely better than three, isn’t it?

“Wait here,” he tells Al. “Keep his wand with you, I’m going upstairs for mine.”

He fetches his wand from his side table, not running into any of them on the way to his room. Can’t find anyone else upstairs, despite looking through every single space—even his own wardrobe, for Merlin’s sake! They must be on the down floor then, but where exactly? Back in his laboratory, perhaps? And that’s what’s going through his mind as he walks back into the kitchen. “I can’t find—”

Scorpius pauses. A wand is pointed at his face. As his eyes follow the arm to its source, he sees Miss Coarse standing behind it.

“Drop yours,” she says. It takes an enormous effort not to roll his eyes again—seriously, what’s up with them and the commands?

“Sorry, Scorp. I just,” Al stammers. His arms are hugging his chest, shoulders hunched into himself. It pains Scorpius to see him like this, a mere shade of who he used to be. “I couldn’t…”

“Drop it, come on,” the woman says, glaring at him threateningly. “Drop your wand, I said!”

Gosh. They’d been so bloody close this time, and now this. Unbelievable.

“I wasn’t lying before, we would have left you alive,” Mr Fox tells him, his own wand pointing at… Merlin, Morgana and Morgawse. Fox’s wand is pointing at _Al_ of all people! Scorpius can’t believe this is happening. He really, really should have stayed quiet, not give them yet more ammo against him with his silly little comment.

“But then you had to go and try and poison us all to death,” he says, poking Scamander with the tip of his shoe. “You’ve got quite a mean streak to you…”

“Drop it,” the woman says again, and yes, all right, just don’t hurt Al. Scorpius opens his hand. The wand falls, rattles against the granite tiles. Then he raises his hands in apology above his shoulders.

As the woman bends down to pick up his wand, a thought crosses his mind: he could kick her, take back his wand. But hers is still pointed at him, Fox’s is pointed at Al… His eyes scrunch. It’d be a waste of time. He doesn’t want Al dead, not in a million years would he want that.

Meanwhile, Al mouths at him, “I’m really, really sorry.”

“It’s all right, Al.” Does it matter anyway? This whole day is going to happen again as soon as they kill him. It’s not like Scorp knows how to stop that, at least not so far.

“Hands, come on,” Miss Coarse says.

Scorpius feels rather tempted not to—she wants his hands? Well, then come get them. It’s actually Al’s begging—“Come on, Scorp. Don’t be silly. Give her your hands, please?”—what somehow manages to tilt him that way. As she ties them down behind Scorp’s back, Mr Fox lowers the wand pointing at Al and… Isn’t that a bit odd? Why would he, indeed?

“Now,” Fox says, “where are they? The files you took from the Ministry.”

“Just tell them, Scorp,” Al mumbles; Scorpius can’t help rolling his eyes. “Just give them what they want.”

“I have a safe,” he says tersely.

“See how easy that was?” the red-haired woman says, kicking one of Scorpius’ sides. Merlin, what’s with her and violence, how come they’re so often in the same sentence? “Cooperation makes the world go round!”

“Where is it?” Fox asks.

Scorpius nods towards the door. “Back in my lab.”

* * *

“Don’t worry, Al. It’s going to be all right.” Scorpius shrugs faintly, granting Al a vague half-smile. Meanwhile, on the far side of the laboratory, the woman pulls out another scroll out of Scorpius’ safe. “Merlin, there’s tons of them in here…”

“We’re gonna have ourselves a good time when we get back,” Fox says. “For the cause!”

“Sure. For the cause.” There’s something surreptitious to Miss Coarse’s smirk that puts Scorpius on edge.

“You have what you came for,” he says, sitting on the edge of the chair, stiff as a board. “Now go. Leave us be.”

“I’m not sure if…” Miss Coarse says. “He’s seen us. He can identify us, if they…”

“We should Obliviate him,” Fox says. “He might Floo the Aurors once we—”

“Or,” the woman starts, “we could kill him. One simple _Avada Kedavra_ will put him where he can’t come back. Besides, he needs to pay for killing two of our comrades.”

“No!” Al stops her, grabbing her wand. “No one else needs to get hurt.”

“Are you sure, boss?” Miss Coarse asks, and this can’t be, he must be hallucinating here. Did she just call Al ‘boss’?

“Yes, of _course_ I’m sure,” replies Al rather scornfully. “We’ve done enough harm as it is, three of ours are dead. We Obliviate him—” he stretches an arm, pointing directly at Scorpius, “—and we leave.”

Scorpius blinks for a second, before carefully admitting to himself that this is no trick, no shade of light or untruth hidden— _Merlin, Al, what are you into?_ Al did betray him, and did it well enough Scorp never even saw it coming. Came here with them, with his intruders, and pretended to be his sorry ex-boyfriend… even went to bed with him all out of spite, spread his legs because he _knew_ Scorp would fall for it. And gladly too.

Fox wraps an arm around Al’s waist. Peering over Al’s shoulder from behind him, his breath whispers just past Al’s ear, “I wasn’t too rough on you, was I?”

Despite Al’s betrayal, rage builds slowly inside Scorpius, scratchy and rough over the rushing in his ears and the mess that is his brain. Finally, Scorp’s shoulders stir, slow and heavy—for a breath, maybe, or for some focus, or maybe for something clearer than the lurching tangle in his mind at the moment. _Treason_ , it whispers. Selling out, dishonesty, deception.

“He’s Malfoy’s son,” Miss Coarse says, suspiciously. “How do we know he’s not working for—”

“We,” snaps Al firmly, “do not kill civilians.”

Fox pauses in his step, glancing at Scorpius with doubtful eyes. “I’m not quite sure _he_ counts as a civilian. He used to work for—”

“Yes, but he _doesn_ _’t_. Not anymore. He’s not working for them now. We leave him be.”

Quiet kind of Al, indeed. Trying to save Scorp's life after _betraying him_ in the worst of ways.

“Hum.” Fox seems to be thinking for quite a long time there, looking almost quite as murderous as Miss Coarse for a couple of seconds. “All right,” he finally says, and then he turns around, telling Scorpius, “It’s your lucky day, champ. We leave and you stay alive.”

“Take anything you can pawn,” Al tells them, “and then we’re out of this shithole.” He approaches Scorpius once the other two are gone, dropping to his knees in front of him. “We really need your scrolls, Scorp.” He pauses, running his tongue over his lips. He touches Scorpius’ face. “Hey, look at me.”

Scorpius jumps a little, sucking in a breath. Forces his head away from Al’s hand, though he wants it. Merlin, does he want it. “You betrayed me,” he spits.

“I’m sorry it turned out this way. We needed some advantage against the Ministry, against your dad.”

Scorpius’ eyes snap to Al’s face. He looks straight at him, sharp as broken glass. His lips are compressed, all dreaminess gone. “And you betrayed _me_ to get it.”

“I know I did. For what it’s worth, I’m sorry.”

“I _believed_ you, I fell for all your stupid lies.” Scorpius shakes his head. “Merlin, Al, I would have given them to you if you—” he sobs a laughter, “—if you had so much as _asked_.”

Al’s thumb slips past his lips as he smiles sadly up at him. “I realise now that perhaps I should have.”

“Yes,” he mumbles against Al’s fingers, “perhaps you should have.” _But you didn_ _’t_.

Al runs both hands over Scorp’s shoulders. Pulls him closer, closing in for a kiss. Scorpius’ lips open obediently under his, as Al lets his hands wander down, skimming over Scorp’s sharp hip bones. But there are steps coming nearer. Al must be hearing them too, because he tells him, “I’ll be back,” as he stands and walks out, carefully closing the door behind him.

It doesn’t stay closed too long, since Fox walks in after he leaves. “So what does that thing do anyway?” he asks, pointing at the experiment that killed his friend. “Besides obviously blasting at everyone who dares touch it.”

Scorpius shrugs. “It’s a magical experiment.”

“Oh, right,” says Fox. “You used to work at the Department of Mysteries, didn’t you?”

Scorpius doesn’t even answer. He sits there, mostly watching, rather bored.

“So… what is it?” Fox asks later. “A weapon or something?”

“No, it’s nothing like that—” His sentence gets interrupted by an “ _Avada Kedavra_!” coming through the door. Albus falls dead through it. “No. No no no.” Scorp tumbles down from the chair, crawling as quickly as he can towards Al’s body, as though doing so would save his life.

In the background, he hears Fox yelling to the woman, “Merlin! What have you done?”

 _No. No, no, no_ … the word reverberates as continual agony. “Merlin, Al,” Scorpius mumbles. “Why?” He chokes on a sob, holding a fist against his mouth. “Why did you have to… _why_?”

He sees the woman raising her wand. It’s pointed at Fox. “ _Avada_ —”

Scorpius uses his last wits to stand up and jump before the killing curse. What’s the point on living when Al is gone? Perhaps if he can restart the day, he can make sure Al leaves alive. The last thing he sees is Al’s face when his hits the ground. His eyes look empty. There’s nothing—no one—behind them, not anymore.

But soon there will be. He’s not letting things stay like this. There must be a way to do things right and, bloody hell, he is going to find it. Even if it takes reliving this day a thousand times.

**Author's Note:**

> If you got this far, thanks tonnes for reading. I do hope you enjoyed it. Kudos & comments are far more than welcome! ♥


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